Katawa Shoujo

The title for this bishoujo-style visual novel.

You find 5 real world cripples as attractive as these and I'll give you a prize.

Katawa Shoujo ("Cripple Girls") is a dating sim created by a development group consisting almost entirely of former 4channers (ie, doomed from the start). Like all dating sims, the goal of the game is to synthesise a relationship because the player does not have the social skills required to do so in the real world. What makes Katawa Shoujo stand out from the rest of perverse games enjoyed by manchildren with an undying respect for all things Japanese (although there is nothing Asian about Katawa Shoujo) is the fact that it takes place at a school for disabled adolescents, and thus the girls in the game are all broken in some fashion. Disabilities dealt with include:

• Having no legs from the knee down.
• Having no arms.
• Being Non-sequitur
• Being deaf
• Being obnoxious with no social repercussion
• Being blind
• Being widely unattractive due to severe BBQ

Despite being a massive turn-off for any mentally stable person, Katawa Shoujo quickly picked up popularity amongst internet animu circlejerks, namely because it is just so damn kawaii.

Being a visual novel, gameplay consists of large blocks of text moving over alternating images, essentially a powerpoint with a storyline of sorts. Katawa Shoujo also has an amazing soudtrack composed of five-second midi loops played for hours on end.

Major Characters

Hisao Nakai

The prototypical angst-ridden teen the player utilizes to interact with the rest of the cast. Shipped off to due to his Arrhythmia, Hisao must learn to conform with living amongst nature's mistakes.

His heart condition is bad enough to attend a special school for physically crippled people, but not quite bad enough to prevent him from doing the horizontal hula with any of the animu princesses in the game.

Emi Ibarazaki

Gameplay with Emi

Warning! Anal

A legless girl whose confidence, self reliance, hyperactive, and perky personality is enough to give anyone who plays this game a lasting migraine.

Whilst going down her route, Hasio embraces her deviant personality, or further lack thereof. Not feeling as if their relationship was progressing as it should be, Hasio breaks up with her despite her tenancies to frequently put out. Ultimately, all is restored and Hasio learns of her reclusive personality due to her dead father and immaturity to put said past aside.

Hanako Ikezawa

The quiet, purple-haired, timid, book-reading, chess-playing and billiards-playing girl whom thousands of lonely weebs masturbate over because she's so kawaii. She has horrific burns on the right hand side of her body and has social anxiety because of it, running away from the slightest bit of interaction anyone has with her. She has no friends apart from Lilly, and the two are often seen scissoring each other in the tea room they use during lunch. She also enjoys playing chess, but sucks because according to Shizune & Misha, she doesn't take it seriously enough. While doing Lilly's route, she grows some balls and joins some newspaper club, makes some friends and even goes travelling with one of them.

When going down her route, Hisao spends the entire story treating her like a Downs patient, "tiptoeing" around her to make conversation and overthinking every little action she makes. On the event of her birthday, she becomes a hermit. Hisao worries his little faggot arse off about her and, depending on the choices you make, you find yourself at the either Bad Ending, where she eventually blows up in his face when he tries to pry her out of her room, the Neutral Ending, where he still visits her room like a Downs patient, but they just end up playing chess, or the Good Ending where he backs off and give her some space and she eventually comes out of hiding. He then shows her his scar and she shows him hers. Hisao, being the fucktard that he is, sees it as a greenlight for sex, seemingly against her will. Day after, things get awkward, they sort shit out and after she tells him that she locked herself in her room because she doesn't want people fussing over her on her birthday, and not because she blames herself for her parents' deaths, they live happily ever after.

Oh and Gimme the Chocolate, Hisao!

Lilly Satou

A tall, blind, blonde-haired blue-eyed girl who is a quiet and refined young woman and is almost always seen sipping tea. She's the class representative of her class, or some shit, and is distantly related to Shizune and the two hate each other just because their dads do. She relies on Hisao, Hanako or her sister Akira to take her anywhere because she can't see. She apparently looks foreign by Japanese standards, and she reveals she has some Scottish heritage and can even speak English and Japanese. You can't really tell the difference though, because she's an animu chick.

When going down her route, she goes to Scotland for a week. In that time Hisao becomes a needy little faggot. When she comes back and they go to a Summer house, and the entire "good girl" facade is thrown entirely out the window, because she fucks Hisao almost as many times as Emi does in her route, only he creampies her and she doesn't fall pregnant, apparently being on the pill. At one point she even shlicks in front of him while he's blindfolded, with which the proceeding sex almost causes him to have a heart attack, so that shit must've been good. Hisao later finds out that she's going back to Scotland soon, this time permanently, leaving Hisao on his own and he chooses to go after her, or not, depending on the choices you make. If he does, when he gets to the airport, CUE THE CONVENIANTLY PLACED PLOT DEVICE! He has a heart attack. He wakes up in hospital and she's there. They live happily ever after. The end.

Rin Tezuka

A red-haired armless girl. She uses her feet to accomplish every day tasks such as eating and painting as well as performing footjobs. She wears a boy’s uniform because she doesn’t want dudes peeking up her skirt when she uses her feet to do menial tasks and while painting, because you know how sick the Japanese are. I mean come on, you're playing an eroge game with physically handicapped girls; you've most likely seen enough animu porn to realise it by now. She has the emotional threshold of a cucumber, and is always spouting random shit, which the other characters find annoying.

When going down her route, Hisao spends the entire time trying to understand what the fuck is going through her mind, but all he ever gets is a footjob, access to her vajayjay so he can finger her, and finally, sex. Apparently even she doesn't know what she wants to do or who she is, which makes no fucking sense whatsoever. Go down the bad route, Hisao shouts at her for being as intelligent as a brick and storms away. Go down the Neutral route, Hisao gets so pissed off with her to the point where he "doesn't know how he feels about her", they "hug" and they go their seperate ways. If you go down the good route, Hisao shouts at her, this time in his room, for being as intelligent as a brick. They later have makeup sex after she turns up at his door, soaked.

Shiina “Misha” Mikado

Kasane Teto The pink-haired asspie that hangs around with Shizune and translates everything that's being said by either Shizune or people around them. She is as loud as a trainwreck at the best of times, apparently, and has a majorly gay thing for Shizune, who, prior to the story, turned Misha down when she asked her out, but won't take no for an answer. Apparently her original hair colour was brown.

While doing Shizune's route, you find out that Misha wants to be a sign language teacher. She cuts her hair half way through and loses the drills, making her look like the dyke that she actually is. She gets depressed near the end of the story for some reason and makes sexual advances on Hisao.

Shizune Hakamichi

A blue-haired bespectacled chick who is a deaf-mute. The only way she can communicate with people is either through Misha, writing down on a notepad or with anyone else who learned Sign language. She's the competitive bitch with far too much Unwarranted self-importance at the best of times, which is the reason she doesn't have any friends apart from Misha. She hates Lilly with a passion and can be frequently be seen roping Hisao into doing slave labour.

If you go down her route, once Hisao learns sign language and can communicate with her himself, you find out that she has has more USI than you originally thought, even going so far as tying him up to a chair and raping him until he creampies her. After a while you find out that Misha is gay for her and is jealous to the core of Hisao and Shizune's relationship. You only make one choice throughout the entire story, and that's choosing to either fuck Misha or reject her. If you reject her, she apologizes for being a fake bisexual slut and cools her shit for a while, then suddenly gets over her depression and cheers the fuck up. If you fuck her, she gets worse. Shizune, who never actually finds out that you cheated on her, breaks up with you.

Minor characters

• Kenji: A legally blind, misanthropic, conspiracy theory nut job with assburgers, who lives opposite Hisao in the boys' dorm. He has a deep rooted hatred for feminists, but not women as a whole. Needless to say, he is the most badass mother-fucker ever. He dispenses timeless advice that should be held above even the highest authoritative figures. You always see him naked at least once before you get to fuck any girls, and he is the faggot that holds the "manly picnic" with you on the school roof and pushes you off the roof you fall off the roof to your bloody, untimely end.

Even though he hides away in his room, sleeps all day and obsessively hates women, it's hinted throughout the game that he dated and fucked Yuuko, essentially making her a rapist/cradle snatcher. That gives him a one-up on you because he's not a virgin. Considering he's not even real, that's a pretty impressive feat.

• Yuuko Shirikawa: Freckled and bespectacled 20-something year old with the biggest tits in the game, with the exception of Emi's mother. She works 2 jobs to pay for her University's tuition fees and whenever she appears, she's highly strung and keeps apologising for stupid shit. As mentioned before, with Kenji, it's hinted that the filthy rapist she dated and fucked Kenji.

• "Nurse": His name's never revealed, but to be honest nobody really gives a shit what it is. He is the kind of guy that would brofist you when you tell him about how you fucked Emi, but could also cut your bollocks off for excercising too much, or too little. He has a bigger role in Emi's route, pretty much introducing the two to each other which ends up in sloppy, legless, loli sex.

• Akio Mutou: Hisao's, Hanako's, Misha's and Shizune's teacher. Passionate about science, but makes little to no sense, apparently, and has little to no connection to reality. Seems to take a liking to Hisao.

• Akira Setou: Lilly's emasculated, alcoholic older sister who wears a suit and promotes underage drinking. She has a boyfriend, so the whole tomboy thing must be a huge turnon for him.

• Meiko Ibarazaki: Emi's mother. TITS.

• Hideaki Hakamichi: Shizune's cross-dressing faggot shota brother, who appears in both Shizune's and Lilly's routes. The character as a whole is about as interesting as watching anti-vandal paint dry.

• Jigoro Hakamichi: Shizune's dad. He always carries around a sword for some reason on another. He is a stone-cold badass who gives no fucks and enjoys eating bear liver even though it's toxic.

• Miki: Half-cast girl with a stump for a hand who has a boyish personality. Speaks to Hisao on a couple of occasions about Emi on Emi's route, a couple of times on Hanako's route, and once on Shizune's.

File:1245174647617.jpg

This makes about as much sense as a monkey piloting an aeroplane is pure fucking genius.

Development and drama

The KS forum also has its own brand of meta-fail: a fanart/fanfiction section where the devs show their own form of appreciation for their fanbase.

The idea for the game came from a joke page drawn by the Eleven artist "Raita". When the page was translated and posted on 4chan's /a/ board, Anonymous loved the idea of a cripple-fucking game. They immediately started outlining the main plot, all-important "love" scenes, and lulzy bad ends. A thread was stickied, a development team was formed, and a dedicated forum was made so they could more effectively circle jerk share ideas circle jerk.

Then the drama began. Members of the team would join and ragequit for various reasons. Some were fired for spending too much time fapping and not enough time working. The plot was written and re-written and the art was drawn and discarded rapidly. But at last, on 9/11 an early development version of the first part of the game was leaked and discussed on 4chan; still, much work remained.

The name "Katawa Shoujo" was also a boner of contention with the Japanese audience, since Katawa means "cripple" and is seen as derogatory. The name was kept, however, to stay in touch with the artistic vision and because it was "too late" to change it to something inoffensive.

During 2008, threads about KS would be quite frequently present on /jp/, causing much rage since the whole thing was considered to be a massive piece of vaporware, as well as many accusations of viral marketing by the game devs. This continues, to the point that now "being a KS dev" is a common accusation on /jp/.

In the spring of 2009, Act 1 of the game was finally released. After much nervousness about how the Japs would take a deliberate attempt to imitate their shitty games (as nerds are constantly seeking validation from one another), the Japanese reaction was neatly summed up in three words: "SUBS FUCKING WHERE?!?" Meanwhile, back in round eye-land, the feedback forum consists mainly of posts saying stuff like "this is the best visual novel I've ever played", which may be a sad commentary on the genre. It might, on the other hand, be an indication that the tastes of basement dwellers are best understood by other basement dwellers. Because the devs forget everything on the internet is forever, they frequently get butthurt when forum posters use dev blog entries and dev-commissioned fanart to spoil plot tweests, calling all the clues obvious trolls.

Moot also changed /jp/'s name from "Japan/General" to "Katawa Shoujo" for a day during early summer of 2009, presumably for the lulz.

Shortly after the demo release, a KS forum devianTard named mugenjohncel, allegedly a former artist turned millionaire businessman/importer/drug trafficker posted a beautiful drawing of one of the heroines tied to a chair and stabbed to death with a pencil, then got b& not for posting guro, but for asking if it could be put in the devs' own SUPER SPESHUL IMAGEDUMP SIET. Being filthy rich and unencumbered by a day job, mugen failed to bitch about it anywhere, instead going on to start his own Ren'Py game where you get to rape and murder a Mexican loli in the nuclear apocalpyse. This was, of course, him wanting to be exactly like 4LS despite the absence of a modern setting in Japan, teenage girls, disabilities, or a staff of infighting manchildren producing it:

<Delta_Kurshiva> http://jpproject.2ksite.com/heavy-metal-girl-madonna-episode-1-humble-origin--p1767.html#p1767

<Delta_Kurshiva> NRRRRRRR

<Blue123> MUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGEEEEN

<Blue123> Mugen faggotry: Slavshit edition

<Delta_Kurshiva> hahaha, he's whining for japanese translation

<Blue123> I thought he said he doesn't want to be like us

<Delta_Kurshiva> "big plans" indeed

<Delta_Kurshiva> oh, he wants to be exactly like us

<Delta_Kurshiva> only, /jp/ and everyone in the world thinks he's fucking aseome

<Delta_Kurshiva> and... it's him. Not us.

<buckingham> do we even have a decent japanese translation effort

<Delta_Kurshiva> Haven't heard back from them yet

<Blue123> Nothing has happened there for about a week or two

<Delta_Kurshiva> I would like to put forward that the translators are fucking lazy.

<buckingham> damn mugen would shit himself with joy if he knew we had a daily event centered around talkibg about him

Fanbase

The fanbase consists of a bunch of L33t romantics, who play the demo despite there being no love making visually depicted. The full game will contain nudity and the sexings, but the developers promise an option that allows players to skip any portions of the game involving sex. Players bring up this option with their parents when trying to advocate why the game is beautiful, and why they are not total perverts for playing it. Lastly the fans of the game also enjoy arguing over which of the fucked up characters they consider to be their waifu, creating many lulz for really cool guyz (AKA fellow /v/irgins) viewing said ronery sadness. Some dedicated fans have been known to sever their own arms upon completion of the game.

Thinking about joining the Katawa Shoujo forums and discussing your favorite cripple girl? Please make sure you enjoy the following before proceeding: The forums are cesspools for Devs so far up their own assholes they believe everyone but themselves are trash, fucktarded users who post terrible photoshops and get their cocks sucked by the rest of the forum, and retards who write terrible fan fiction about the burn girl getting her charred cock sucked by the deaf girl.

If you enjoy all those things, a forums account may just be the thing for you!

Failart

Gallery About missing Pics

• 
  A series of ways the player can meet his untimely death.
• 
  Even failed wrestlers wish to be the cripple girl.
• 
  That fag from Code Geass finally found his home. Hey, that dude in the back has a fucking cane. What is this a class of cripples or something?
• 
  No burn victim on the planet would wear a bikini. Animu lies.

[Collapse GalleryExpand Gallery]

• 
  There are 3 puns here. Can you SEE them all?
• 
  What Rin was born for.
• 
  The sad truth that most ronery fags must face when playing this game. It's porn.
• Hahahah! It's funny because the creator used the incorrect form of "there"!
  Hahahah! It's funny because the creator used the incorrect form of "there"!
• 
  Ridiculous hair style that will do the impossible and fight da powa.
• 
  The opinions of players with truly superior tastes.
• 
  The opinions of the characters themselves.
• 
  Misha summarizes her thoughts on you.
• 
  BTW, She's objecting to your sexual advances.
• 
  A question all players end up asking themselves at one point in the game. Then they order a pizza.
• 
  Interpreter fail.
• 
  Hanako making a great suggestwin.
• 
  Rin, great hide & seek player or GREATEST hide & seek player.
• 
  Rin is an armless ADD asswipe.
• 
  The final boss of the game clasping your torso with her its mighty claws.
• 
  The cancer that is killing Misha is...cancer.
• 
  HAHAHAHA, it's funny because he's actually a fagot.
• 
  This turns on fans because they are sick fucks
• 
  You're looking the wrong way you dumb blind bitch!
• 
  Protip: If someone laughs while giving you a blowjob kill yourself.
• 
  Protip: Pretending your dick is a balloon is a bad idea.
• 
  Protip: If you get off on rape, don't fuck a mute.
• 
  Protip: When your partner asks for "the chocolate" in bed, shit in her mouth.
• 
  Dick Cheney had a heart condition.....

See Also

• Dating sim - What this is.
• Online sex games - Not quite what this is.
• Animu - The style the characters are based after.
• Ronery - What you are.
• Hentai - What this essentially is.

Links

• http://katawa-shoujo.com/ - The homepage.
• http://ks.renai.us/ - The forum where the sick fucks like you go, to talk about the game.
• http://shimmie.katawa-shoujo.com/ - The art page where said sick fucks like you go to fap to pictures related to the game
• http://katawashoujo.blogspot.com/2009/08/view-from-gallery-season-5-episode-4.html - The blog where devs highlight each others' achievements and articulate their relationship with their fanbase

Katawa Shoujo is part of a series on Gaming Visit the Gaming Portal for complete coverage.

Katawa Shoujo is part of a series on Chans Visit the Chans Portal for complete coverage.

February 19 and 20, 2012
Preceded by Greece	Katawa Shoujo	Succeeded by Jews did WTC